Cicero last words
Cicero
Roman statesman and lawyer (–43 BC)
For other uses, see Cicero (disambiguation).
"Ciceronian" redirects here. For the imitation of Ciceronian style, see Ciceronianism.
Marcus Tullius Cicero[a] (SISS-ə-roh; Latin:[ˈmaːrkʊsˈtʊlli.ʊsˈkɪkɛroː]; 3 January BC&#;– 7 December 43&#;BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, writer and Academic skeptic,[4] who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the establishment of the Roman extensive writings include treatises on rhetoric, philosophy and politics.
He is considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists and the innovator of what became known as "Ciceronian rhetoric".[6][7][8] Cicero was educated in Rome and in Greece. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the Roman equestrian order, and served as consul in 63&#;BC.
He greatly influenced both ancient and modern reception of the Latin language. A substantial part of his work has survived, and he was admired by both ancient and modern authors alike.[9][10][11] Cicero adapted the arguments of the chief schools of Hellenistic philosophy in Latin and coined a large portion of Latin philosophical vocabulary via lexical innovation (e.g.
neologisms such as evidentia,[12]generator, humanitas, infinitio, qualitas, quantitas),[13] almost of which were the result of translating Greek philosophical terms.[14]
Though he was an accomplished orator and successful lawyer, Cicero believed his political career was his most important achievement.
It was during his consulship that the Catiline conspiracy attempted to overthrow the government through an attack on the city by outside forces, and Cicero (by his own account) suppressed the revolt by summarily and controversially executing five conspirators without trial, an act which would later lead to his exile. During the chaotic middle period of the first century BC, marked by civil wars and the dictatorship of Julius Caesar, Cicero was a supporter of the Optimates faction.
Following Caesar's death, Cicero became an enemy of Mark Antony in the ensuing power struggle, attacking him in a series of speeches. He was proscribed as an enemy of the state by the Second Triumvirate and consequently executed by soldiers operating on their behalf in 43&#;BC, having been intercepted during an attempted flight from the Italian peninsula.
His severed hands and head (taken by order of Antony and displayed representing the repercussions of his anti-Antonian actions as a writer and as an orator, respectively) were then displayed on the Rostra.[15]
Petrarch's rediscovery of Cicero's letters is often credited for initiating the 14th-century Renaissance in public affairs, humanism, and classical Roman culture.[16] According to Polish historian Tadeusz Zieliński, "the Renaissance was above all things a revival of Cicero, and only after him and through him of the rest of Classical antiquity."[17] The peak of Cicero's authority and prestige came during the 18th-century Enlightenment,[18] and his impact on leading Enlightenment thinkers and political theorists such as John Locke, David Hume, Montesquieu, and Edmund Burke was substantial.[19] His works rank among the most influential in global culture, and today still constitute one of the most important bodies of primary material for the writing and revision of Roman history, especially the last days of the Roman Republic.[20]
Early life
Marcus Tullius Cicero was born on 3 January &#;BC in Arpinum, a hill town kilometers (62&#;mi) southeast of Rome.[21] He belonged to the tribus Cornelia.[22] His father was a wealthy member of the equestrian order and possessed good connections in Rome.
However, being a semi-invalid, he could not enter public life and studied extensively to compensate. Little is known about Cicero's mother Helvia, but Cicero's brother Quintus wrote in a letter that she was a thrifty housewife.[23]
Cicero's cognomen, a hereditary nickname, comes from the Latin for chickpea, cicer.
Plutarch explains that the name was originally given to one of Cicero's ancestors who had a cleft in the tip of his nose resembling a chickpea. The famous family names of Fabius, Lentulus, and Piso come from the Latin names of beans, lentils, and peas, respectively. Plutarch writes that Cicero was urged to change this deprecatory name when he entered politics, but refused, saying that he would make Cicero more glorious than Scaurus ("Swollen-ankled") and Catulus ("Puppy").
At the age of 15, in 90&#;BC, Cicero started serving under Pompey Strabo and later Sulla in the Social war between Rome and its Italian allies.
When in Rome during the turbulent plebeian tribunate of Publius Sulpicius Rufus in 88&#;BC which saw a short bout of fighting between the Sulpicius and Sulla, who had been elected consul for that year, Cicero found himself greatly impressed by Sulpicius' oratory even if he disagreed with his politics. He continued his studies at Rome, writing a pamphlet titled On Invention relating to rhetorical argumentation and studying philosophy with Greek academics who had fled the ongoing First Mithridatic War.
Education
During this period in Roman history, Greek language and cultural studies were highly valued by the elite classes.
Cicero was therefore educated in the teachings of the ancient Greek philosophers, poets and historians; as he obtained much of his understanding of the theory and practice of rhetoric from the Greek poet Archias. Cicero used his knowledge of Greek to translate many of the theoretical concepts of Greek philosophy into Latin, thus translating Greek philosophical works for a larger audience.
It was precisely his broad education that tied him to the traditional Roman elite.
Cicero's interest in philosophy figured heavily in his later career and led to him providing a comprehensive account of Greek philosophy for a Roman audience,[31] including creating a philosophical vocabulary in Latin.
In 87 BC, Philo of Larissa, the head of the Platonic Academy that had been founded by Plato in Athens about years earlier, arrived in Rome. Cicero, "inspired by an extraordinary zeal for philosophy",[33] sat enthusiastically at his feet and absorbed Carneades' Academic Skeptic philosophy.[34][35]
According to Plutarch, Cicero was an extremely talented student, whose learning attracted attention from all over Rome, affording him the opportunity to study Roman law under Quintus Mucius Scaevola.
Cicero's fellow students were Gaius Marius Minor, Servius Sulpicius Rufus (who became a famous lawyer, one of the few whom Cicero considered superior to himself in legal matters), and Titus Pomponius. The latter two became Cicero's friends for life, and Pomponius (who later received the nickname "Atticus", and whose sister married Cicero's brother) would become, in Cicero's own words, "as a second brother", with both maintaining a lifelong correspondence.
In 79 BC, Cicero left for Greece, Asia Minor and Rhodes.
This was perhaps to avoid the potential wrath of Sulla, as Plutarch claims,[38] though Cicero himself says it was to hone his skills and improve his physical fitness. In Athens he studied philosophy with Antiochus of Ascalon, the 'Old Academic' and initiator of Middle Platonism. In Asia Minor, he met the leading orators of the region and continued to study with them.
Cicero then journeyed to Rhodes to meet his former teacher, Apollonius Molon, who had taught him in Rome. Molon helped Cicero hone the excesses in his style, as well as train his body and lungs for the demands of public speaking. Charting a middle path between the competing Attic and Asiatic styles, Cicero would ultimately become considered second only to Demosthenes among history's orators.[42]
Early career
Main article: Political career of Cicero
Early legal activity
While Cicero had feared that the law courts would be closed forever, they were reopened in the aftermath of Sulla's civil war and the purging of Sulla's political opponents in the proscriptions.
Many of the orators whom Cicero had admired in his youth were now dead from age or political violence. His first major appearance in the courts was in 81&#;BC at the age of 26 when he delivered Pro Quinctio, a speech defending certain commercial transactions which Cicero had recorded and disseminated.[43]
His more famous speech defending Sextus Roscius of Ameria – Pro Roscio Amerino – on charges of parricide in 80&#;BC was his first appearance in criminal court.
In this high-profile case, Cicero accused a freedman of the dictator Sulla, Chrysogonus, of fabricating Roscius' father's proscription to obtain Roscius' family's property. Successful in his defence, Cicero tactfully avoided incriminating Sulla of any wrongdoing and developed a positive oratorical reputation for himself.
While Plutarch claims that Cicero left Rome shortly thereafter out of fear of Sulla's response, according to Kathryn Tempest, "most scholars now dismiss this suggestion" because Cicero left Rome after Sulla resigned his dictatorship.
Cicero, for his part, later claimed that he left Rome, headed for Asia, to develop his physique and develop his oratory. After marrying his wife, Terentia, in 80&#;BC, he eventually left for Asia Minor with his brother Quintus, his friend Titus Atticus, and others on a long trip spanning most of 79 through 77&#;BC. Returning to Rome in 77&#;BC, Cicero again busied himself with legal defence.[47]
Early political career
In 76&#;BC, at the quaestorian elections, Cicero was elected at the minimum age required – 30 years – in the first returns from the comitia tributa, to the post of quaestor.
Ex officio, he also became a member of the Senate. In the quaestorian lot, he was assigned to Sicily for 75&#;BC. The post, which was largely one related to financial administration in support of the state or provincial governors, proved for Cicero an important place where he could gain clients in the provinces. His time in Sicily saw him balance his duties – largely in terms of sending more grain back to Rome – with his support for the provincials, Roman businessmen in the area, and local potentates.
Adeptly balancing those responsibilities, he won their gratitude. He was also appreciated by local Syracusans for the rediscovery of the lost tomb of Archimedes, which he personally financed.[49]
Promising to lend the Sicilians his oratorical voice, he was called on a few years after his quaestorship to prosecute the Roman province's governor Gaius Verres,[50] for abuse of power and corruption.
In 70&#;BC, at the age of 36, Cicero launched his first high-profile prosecution against Verres, an emblem of the corrupt Sullan supporters who had risen in the chaos of the civil war.
The prosecution of Gaius Verres was a great forensic success[53] for Cicero.
Biography cicero marcus tullius They inadvertently created an emperor. He divorced her about 46 BCE, and married his young ward, Publilia, but that didn't last long—Cicero didn't think that Publilia was upset enough over the loss of his daughter. For More Information Everett, Anthony. These works were also to some extent based on Greek ideas.While Verres hired the prominent lawyer, Quintus Hortensius, after a lengthy period in Sicily collecting testimonials and evidence and persuading witnesses to come forward, Cicero returned to Rome and won the case in a series of dramatic court battles. His unique style of oratory set him apart from the flamboyant Hortensius. On the conclusion of this case, Cicero came to be considered the greatest orator in Rome.
The view that Cicero may have taken the case for reasons of his own is viable. Hortensius was, at this point, known as the best lawyer in Rome; to beat him would guarantee much success and the prestige that Cicero needed to start his career.
Marcus tullius cicero Formiae, Latinum Roman orator and writer. His other peerless contribution was his correspondence. Cicero's close associate Marcus Tullius Tiro, the collector of many of his letters, had once been owned by Cicero's family. Cicero is considered the pre-eminent Master of Latin prose — writing with a unique freedom, clarity and directness.Cicero's oratorical ability is shown in his character assassination of Verres and various other techniques of persuasion used on the jury. One such example is found in the speech In Verrem, where he states "with you on this bench, gentlemen, with Marcus Acilius Glabrio as your president, I do not understand what Verres can hope to achieve".[54] Oratory was considered a great art in ancient Rome and an important tool for disseminating knowledge and promoting oneself in elections, in part because there were no regular newspapers or mass media.
Cicero was neither a patrician nor a plebeian noble; his rise to political office despite his relatively humble origins has traditionally been attributed to his brilliance as an orator.[55]
Cicero grew up in a time of civil unrest and war. Sulla's victory in the first of a series of civil wars led to a new constitutional framework that undermined libertas (liberty), the fundamental value of the Roman Republic.
Nonetheless, Sulla's reforms strengthened the position of the equestrian class, contributing to that class's growing political power. Cicero was both an Italian eques and a novus homo, but more importantly he was a Roman constitutionalist. His social class and loyalty to the Republic ensured that he would "command the support and confidence of the people as well as the Italian middle classes".
The optimates faction never truly accepted Cicero, and this undermined his efforts to reform the Republic while preserving the constitution. Nevertheless, he successfully ascended the cursus honorum, holding each magistracy at or near the youngest possible age: quaestor in 75 BC (age 30), aedile in 69 BC (age 36), and praetor in 66 BC (age 39), when he served as president of the extortion court.
He was then elected consul at age [citation needed]
Consulship
Cicero, seizing the opportunity offered by optimate fear of reform, was elected consul for the year 63 BC;[56] he was elected with the support of every unit of the centuriate assembly, rival members of the post-Sullan establishment, and the leaders of municipalities throughout post-Social War Italy.
His co-consul for the year, Gaius Antonius Hybrida, played a minor role.[58]
He began his consular year by opposing a land bill proposed by a plebeian tribune which would have appointed commissioners with semi-permanent authority over land reform.[56] Cicero was also active in the courts, defending Gaius Rabirius from accusations of participating in the unlawful killing of plebeian tribune Lucius Appuleius Saturninus in BC.
The prosecution occurred before the comita centuriata and threatened to reopen conflict between the Marian and Sullan factions at Rome. Cicero defended the use of force as being authorised by a senatus consultum ultimum, which would prove similar to his own use of force under such conditions.
Catilinarian Conspiracy
Main article: Catilinarian conspiracy
Most famously&#;&#; in part because of his own publicity&#;&#; he thwarted a conspiracy led by Lucius Sergius Catilina to overthrow the Roman Republic with the help of foreign armed forces.
Cicero procured a senatus consultum ultimum (a recommendation from the senate attempting to legitimise the use of force) and drove Catiline from the city with four vehement speeches (the Catilinarian orations), which remain outstanding examples of his rhetorical style. The Orations listed Catiline and his followers' debaucheries, and denounced Catiline's senatorial sympathizers as roguish and dissolute debtors clinging to Catiline as a final and desperate hope.
Biography cicero marcus tullius movies: The much shorter "Pro Archia" 62 B. It would not be the last time Cicero spoke out about those of higher power. The fourteen "Philippics" are probably the finest, however, because in them Cicero concentrated all of his energy and skill with a directness that he did not always achieve. Whoever neglects this law, whether written or unwritten, is necessarily unjust and wicked.
Cicero demanded that Catiline and his followers leave the city. At the conclusion of Cicero's first speech (which was made in the Temple of Jupiter Stator), Catiline hurriedly left the Senate. In his following speeches, Cicero did not directly address Catiline. He delivered the second and third orations before the people, and the last one again before the Senate.
By these speeches, Cicero wanted to prepare the Senate for the worst possible case; he also delivered more evidence, against Catiline.[62]
Catiline fled and left behind his followers to start the revolution from within while he himself assaulted the city with an army of "moral and financial bankrupts, or of honest fanatics and adventurers".[63] It is alleged that Catiline had attempted to involve the Allobroges, a tribe of Transalpine Gaul, in their plot, but Cicero, working with the Gauls, was able to seize letters that incriminated the five conspirators and forced them to confess in front of the Senate.[64] The senate then deliberated upon the conspirators' punishment.
As it was the dominant advisory body to the various legislative assemblies rather than a judicial body, there were limits to its power; however, martial law was in effect, and it was feared that simple house arrest or exile&#;– the standard options&#;– would not remove the threat to the state. At first Decimus Junius Silanus spoke for the "extreme penalty"; but during the debate many were swayed by Julius Caesar, who decried the precedent it would set and argued in favor of life imprisonment in various Italian towns.
Cato the Younger then rose in defense of the death penalty and the Senate finally agreed on the matter, and came down in support of the death penalty. Cicero had the conspirators taken to the Tullianum, the notorious Roman prison, where they were strangled. Cicero himself accompanied the former consul Publius Cornelius Lentulus Sura, one of the conspirators, to the Tullianum.[65]
Cicero received the honorific "pater patriae" for his efforts to suppress the conspiracy, but lived thereafter in fear of trial or exile for having put Roman citizens to death without trial.[67] While the senatus consultum ultimum gave some legitimacy to the use of force against the conspirators,[b] Cicero also argued that Catiline's conspiracy, by virtue of its treason, made the conspirators enemies of the state and forfeited the protections intrinsically possessed by Roman citizens.
The consuls moved decisively. Antonius Hybrida was dispatched to defeat Catiline in battle that year, preventing Crassus or Pompey from exploiting the situation for their own political aims.
After the suppression of the conspiracy, Cicero was proud of his accomplishment.[69] Some of his political enemies argued that though the act gained Cicero popularity, he exaggerated the extent of his success.
He overestimated his popularity again several years later after being exiled from Italy and then allowed back from exile. At this time, he claimed that the republic would be restored along with him.[70]
Shortly after completing his consulship, in late 62&#;BC, Cicero arranged the purchase of a large townhouse on the Palatine Hill previously owned by Rome's richest citizen, Marcus Licinius Crassus.
To finance the purchase, Cicero borrowed some two million sesterces from Publius Cornelius Sulla, whom he had previously defended from court.[72] Cicero boasted his house was "in conspectu prope totius urbis" ("in sight of nearly the whole city"), only a short walk from the Roman Forum.[73]
Exile and return
In 60 BC, Julius Caesar invited Cicero to be the fourth member of his existing partnership with Pompey and Marcus Licinius Crassus, an assembly that would eventually be called the First Triumvirate.
Cicero refused the invitation because he suspected it would undermine the Republic,[74] and because he was strongly opposed to anything unconstitutional that limited the powers of the consuls and replaced them with non-elected officials.
During Caesar's consulship of 59 BC, the triumvirate had achieved many of their goals of land reform, publicani debt forgiveness, ratification of Pompeian conquests, etc.
With Caesar leaving for his provinces, they wished to maintain their hold on politics. They engineered the adoption of patrician Publius Clodius Pulcher into a plebeian family and had him elected as one of the ten tribunes of the plebs for 58 BC. Clodius used the triumvirate's backing to push through legislation that benefited them.
He introduced several laws (the leges Clodiae) that made him popular with the people, strengthening his power base, then he turned on Cicero. Clodius passed a law which made it illegal to offer "fire and water" (i.e. shelter or food) to anyone who executed a Roman citizen without a trial. Cicero, having executed members of the Catiline conspiracy four years previously without formal trial, was clearly the intended target.
Furthermore, many believed that Clodius acted in concert with the triumvirate who feared that Cicero would seek to abolish many of Caesar's accomplishments while consul the year before. Cicero argued that the senatus consultum ultimum indemnified him from punishment, and he attempted to gain the support of the senators and consuls, especially of Pompey.[77]
Cicero grew out his hair, dressed in mourning and toured the streets.
Clodius' gangs dogged him, hurling abuse, stones and even excrement. Hortensius, trying to rally to his old rival's support, was almost lynched. The Senate and the consuls were cowed. Caesar, who was still encamped near Rome, was apologetic but said he could do nothing when Cicero brought himself to grovel in the proconsul's tent.
Everyone seemed to have abandoned Cicero.[78]
After Clodius passed a law to deny to Cicero fire and water (i.e. shelter) within four hundred miles of Rome, Cicero went into exile. He arrived at Thessalonica, on 23 May 58&#;BC.[79][80][81] In his absence, Clodius, who lived next door to Cicero on the Palatine, arranged for Cicero's house to be confiscated by the state, and was even able to purchase a part of the property in order to extend his own house.[73] After demolishing Cicero's house, Clodius had the land consecrated and symbolically erected a temple of Liberty (aedes Libertatis) on the vacant land.
Cicero's exile caused him to fall into depression.
He wrote to Atticus: "Your pleas have prevented me from committing suicide. But what is there to live for? Don't blame me for complaining. My afflictions surpass any you ever heard of earlier".[83] After the intervention of recently elected tribune Titus Annius Milo, acting on the behalf of Pompey who wanted Cicero as a client, the Senate voted in favor of recalling Cicero from exile.
Clodius cast the single vote against the decree. Cicero returned to Italy on 5 August 57&#;BC, landing at Brundisium.[84] He was greeted by a cheering crowd, and, to his delight, his beloved daughter Tullia.[85] In his Oratio De Domo Sua Ad Pontifices, Cicero convinced the College of Pontiffs to rule that the consecration of his land was invalid, thereby allowing him to regain his property and rebuild his house on the Palatine.[87]
Cicero tried to re-enter politics as an independent operator, but his attempts to attack portions of Caesar's legislation were unsuccessful and encouraged Caesar to re-solidify his political alliance with Pompey and Crassus.
The conference at Luca in 56&#;BC left the three-man alliance in domination of the republic's politics; this forced Cicero to recant and support the triumvirate out of fear from being entirely excluded from public life. After the conference, Cicero lavishly praised Caesar's achievements, got the Senate to vote a thanksgiving for Caesar's victories, and grant money to pay his troops.
He also delivered a speech 'On the consular provinces' (Latin: de provinciis consularibus) which checked an attempt by Caesar's enemies to strip him of his provinces in Gaul.[91] After this, a cowed Cicero concentrated on his literary works. It is uncertain whether he was directly involved in politics for the following few years.[92] His legal work largely consisted of defending allies of the ruling triumvirs and his own personal friends and allies; he defended his former pupil Marcus Caelius Rufus against a charge of murder in [93] Under the influence of the triumvirs, he had also defended his former enemies Publius Vatinius (in August 54&#;BCE), Marcus Aemilius Scaurus (between July and September) and Gnaeus Plancius (with the Pro Plancio) in September, which weakened his prestige and sparked attacks on his integrity: Luca Grillo has suggested these cases as the source of the poet Catullus's double-edged comment that Cicero was "the best defender of anybody".[94]
Governorship of Cilicia
In 51 BC he reluctantly accepted a promagistracy (as proconsul) in Cilicia for the year; there were few other former consuls eligible as a result of a legislative requirement enacted by Pompey in 52&#;BC specifying an interval of five years between a consulship or praetorship and a provincial command.
He served as proconsul of Cilicia from May 51 BC, arriving in the provinces three months later around August.
In 53 BC Marcus Licinius Crassus had been defeated by the Parthians at the Battle of Carrhae. This opened the Roman East for a Parthian invasion, causing unrest in Syria and Cilicia. Cicero restored calm by his mild system of government.
He discovered that a great amount of public property had been embezzled by corrupt previous governors and members of their staff, and did his utmost to restore it. Thus he greatly improved the condition of the cities.[98] He retained the civil rights of, and exempted from penalties, the men who gave the property back.[99] Besides this, he was extremely frugal in his outlays for staff and private expenses during his governorship, and this made him highly popular among the natives.[]
Besides his activity in ameliorating the hard pecuniary situation of the province, Cicero was also creditably active in the military sphere.
Early in his governorship he received information that prince Pacorus, son of Orodes II the king of the Parthians, had crossed the Euphrates, and was ravaging the Syrian countryside and had even besieged Cassius (the interim Roman commander in Syria) in Antioch.[] Cicero eventually marched with two understrength legions and a large contingent of auxiliary cavalry to Cassius's relief.
Pacorus and his army had already given up on besieging Antioch and were heading south through Syria, ravaging the countryside again. Cassius and his legions followed them, harrying them wherever they went, eventually ambushing and defeating them near Antigonea.[]
Another large troop of Parthian horsemen was defeated by Cicero's cavalry who happened to run into them while scouting ahead of the main army.
Cicero next defeated some robbers who were based on Mount Amanus and was hailed as imperator by his troops. Afterwards he led his army against the independent Cilician mountain tribes, besieging their fortress of Pindenissum. It took him 47 days to reduce the place, which fell in December.[] On 30 July 50 BC Cicero left the province to his brother Quintus, who had accompanied him on his governorship as his legate.[] On his way back to Rome he stopped in Rhodes and then went to Athens, where he caught up with his old friend Titus Pomponius Atticus and met men of great learning.[]
Julius Caesar's civil war
Cicero arrived in Rome on 4 January 49 BC.
He stayed outside the pomerium, to retain his promagisterial powers: either in expectation of a triumph or to retain his independent command authority in the coming civil war. The struggle between Pompey and Julius Caesar grew more intense in 50 BC. Cicero favored Pompey, seeing him as a defender of the senate and Republican tradition, but at that time avoided openly alienating Caesar.[] When Caesar invaded Italy in 49 BC, Cicero fled Rome.
Caesar, seeking an endorsement by a senior senator, courted Cicero's favor, but even so Cicero slipped out of Italy and traveled to Dyrrhachium where Pompey's staff was situated. Cicero traveled with the Pompeian forces to Pharsalus in Macedonia in 48 BC,[] though he was quickly losing faith in the competence and righteousness of the Pompeian side.
Eventually, he provoked the hostility of his fellow senator Cato, who told him that he would have been of more use to the cause of the optimates if he had stayed in Rome. After Caesar's victory at the Battle of Pharsalus on 9 August, Cicero refused to take command of the Pompeian forces and continue the war. He returned to Rome, still as a promagistrate with his lictors, in 47 BC, and dismissed them upon his crossing the pomerium and renouncing his command.
In a letter to Varro on c.&#;20 April 46 BC, Cicero outlined his strategy under Caesar's dictatorship.
Biography cicero marcus tullius death Cicero sought to avoid civil conflict and only justified war for the self-defence of a state. In December 43 B. Cicero's first appearances in court were made during the dictatorship a form of government where one person rules with absolute power of Sulla 81—80 B. Apart from his increasing dislike of Caesar's absolute rule, Cicero's life was made unhappy during these years by domestic sorrows.Cicero, however, was taken by surprise when the Liberatores assassinated Caesar on the ides of March, 44 BC. Cicero was not included in the conspiracy, even though the conspirators were sure of his sympathy. Marcus Junius Brutus called out Cicero's name, asking him to restore the republic when he lifted his bloodstained dagger after the assassination.[] A letter Cicero wrote in February 43 BC to Trebonius, one of the conspirators, began, "How I could wish that you had invited me to that most glorious banquet on the Ides of March!"[][] Cicero became a popular leader during the period of instability following the assassination.
He had no respect for Mark Antony, who was scheming to take revenge upon Caesar's murderers. In exchange for amnesty for the assassins, he arranged for the Senate to agree not to declare Caesar to have been a tyrant, which allowed the Caesarians to have lawful support and kept Caesar's reforms and policies intact.[]
Opposition to Mark Antony and death
In April 43 BC, "diehard republicans" may have revived the ancient position of princeps senatus (leader of the senate) for Cicero.
This position had been very prestigious until the constitutional reforms of Sulla in 82–80 BC, which removed most of its importance.[]
On the other side, Antony was consul and leader of the Caesarian faction, and unofficial executor of Caesar's public will. Relations between the two were never friendly and worsened after Cicero claimed that Antony was taking liberties in interpreting Caesar's wishes and intentions.
Octavian was Caesar's adopted son and heir. After he returned to Italy, Cicero began to play him against Antony. He praised Octavian, declaring he would not make the same mistakes as his father. He attacked Antony in a series of speeches he called the Philippics,[] named after Demosthenes's denunciations of Philip&#;II of Macedon.
At the time, Cicero's popularity as a public figure was unrivalled.[]
Cicero supported Decimus Junius Brutus Albinus as governor of Cisalpine Gaul (Gallia Cisalpina) and urged the Senate to name Antony an enemy of the state. The speech of Lucius Piso, Caesar's father-in-law, delayed proceedings against Antony.
Antony was later declared an enemy of the state when he refused to lift the siege of Mutina, which was in the hands of Decimus Brutus. Cicero's plan to drive out Antony failed. Antony and Octavian reconciled and allied with Lepidus to form the Second Triumvirate after the successive battles of Forum Gallorum and Mutina. The alliance came into official existence with the lex Titia, passed on 27 November 43 BC, which gave each triumvir a consular imperium for five years.
Biography cicero marcus tullius wife Measure advertising performance. His philosophic writings give thought to the idea that all men are created equal. In 79 B. Biography of Pompey the Great, Roman Statesman.The Triumvirate immediately began a proscription of their enemies, modeled after that of Sulla in 82 BC. Cicero and all of his contacts and supporters were numbered among the enemies of the state, even though Octavian argued for two days against Cicero being added to the list.[]
Cicero was one of the most viciously and doggedly hunted among the proscribed.
He was viewed with sympathy by a large segment of the public and many people refused to report that they had seen him. He was caught on 7 December 43&#;BC leaving his villa in Formiae in a litter heading to the seaside, where he hoped to embark on a ship destined for Macedonia.[] When his killers – Herennius (a Centurion) and Popilius (a Tribune) – arrived, Cicero's own slaves said they had not seen him, but he was given away by Philologus, a freedman of his brother Quintus Cicero.[]
As reported by Seneca the Elder, according to the historian Aufidius Bassus, Cicero's last words are said to have been:
Ego vero consisto.
Accede, veterane, et, si hoc saltim potes recte facere, incide cervicem.
I go no further: approach, veteran soldier, and, if you can at least do so much properly, sever this neck.[]
He bowed to his captors, leaning his head out of the litter in a gladiatorial gesture to ease the task.
By baring his neck and throat to the soldiers, he was indicating that he would not resist. According to Plutarch, Herennius first slew him, then cut off his head. On Antony's instructions his hands, which had penned the Philippics against Antony, were cut off as well; these were nailed along with his head on the Rostra in the Forum Romanum according to the tradition of Marius and Sulla, both of whom had displayed the heads of their enemies in the Forum.
Cicero was the only victim of the proscriptions who was displayed in that manner. According to Cassius Dio, in a story often mistakenly attributed to Plutarch,[] Antony's wife Fulvia took Cicero's head, pulled out his tongue, and jabbed it repeatedly with her hairpin in final revenge against Cicero's power of speech.[]
Cicero's son, Marcus Tullius Cicero Minor, during his year as a consul in 30 BC, avenged his father's death, to a certain extent, when he announced to the Senate Mark Antony's naval defeat at Actium in 31 BC by Octavian.
Octavian is reported to have praised Cicero as a patriot and a scholar of meaning in later times, within the circle of his family.